Every day we need to engage with others to seek support, get things done, collaborate to generate ideas and deliver outcomes.
While we have best intentions at heart, we sometimes experience friction and frustration because someone missed a deadline or did not deliver the expected outcomes which derailed the entire team or project. There are also times when hours of effort in putting together a proposal goes wasted because the stakeholders didn’t approve it and it needs to be reworked.
The follow-up and re-work that results from these frustrations causes significant loss of time, money, opportunity and morale.
The BIG question that comes to mind is – Did we ENGAGE well?
Through years of leading the Employee Engagement and Leadership Development areas, I have found a simple approach for engaging others in a range of situations where you need to:
- Get collaboration and engagement of others for a project that you are leading.
- Get endorsement or approval for your plan from your leader or stakeholder.
- Delegate work to someone.
It’s all about getting responses to just three questions from the people you want to engage with. These are learnings from the Gallup’s Employee Engagement & Q12 survey.
The magic happens when you focus on receiving the responses to these three questions rather than just asking them.
This simple 1-2-3 approach will help you to focus on receiving the responses to the three questions.
Simply put the 1-2-3 approach for engaging others is about:
- One Open Mind
- Two Opportunities
- Three Questions
One Open Mind – “See from their eyes, not from your lens.”
To prepare yourself for receiving responses to the three questions: Do not try to guess or assume the thinking and needs of others. Keep an open mind and listen to what they have to say. Give yourself time and opportunity to understand their situations and priorities.
Two Opportunities – You have two opportunities to think about and prepare yourself to receive the responses to the three questions. Use both opportunities wisely.
i) Before you engage with people for any action/ outcome from them:
Spend some time to hear from them about their situations and priorities. Ask about their current focus in terms of their professional and development goals. Learn about their pressures and concerns.
This will also help build rapport and confidence.
ii) Immediately after you have engaged with them and asked for what you need:
This is the opportunity to explicitly ask the three questions and assess your effectiveness. This is where alignment, commitment and motivation gets confirmed.
The responses you receive enable timely opportunity to fill any gaps in understanding, reinforce commitment and motivation to support you.
Make it easy of them to respond to the three questions. You may even use a simple 1 to 5 scale where 5 is “Completely Agree” and 1 is “Completely Disagree”.
Three Questions
Finally, here are the three questions that you are seeking responses for. These questions should be answered by the people you are engaging. DO NOT try to assume or guess the responses for others, let them answer please. If needed, you may help them with deeper understanding of the questions.
i) Do I know what is expected of me?
Sample considerations: I know what needs to be done, by when and how the outcomes will be measured. I clearly understand what the start and finish looks like.
ii) Do I have the materials/tools to do this work?
Sample considerations: I have the time to do this work. I have access to all the information, software/systems, tools/templates, any other people and resources that I will need to complete the requested work with desired quality of outcomes within the required time.
iii) Is the purpose of this task/activity important and inspiring for me?
Sample considerations: I understand how this requested piece of work fits in the bigger picture. I know “What’s In it for me”. What the completion of this work leads to is important for me. The effort will contribute to my development and/or drive me forward towards achievement of my goals.
When applied consistently, this approach builds greater engagement, trust and alignment that results in higher collaboration, timely and quality outcomes. As a leader you will also save your time and energy from reduced follow-up and uncertainty.
Get started, try it out and share your experience. (mail to [email protected])
Get in touch if you need support in applying the 1-2-3 approach
References:
- Gallup’s Employee engagement : Q12 Survey